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Yes indeedie... Guiding is really a requirement of great images... You can polar align your mount within arc sec of the pole, and still not obtain 5~10 minute exposures without tracking errors.. Why? Because there is more at play than just the earths rotation and your RA drive. the atmosphere is unpredictable, and refractive. meaning that it can bend and shift light around, potentially ruining images.. Guiding can definitely help here... Also, depending on your mount, you RA drive is not going to be perfect. PE is a problem also...
With nearly 4 hours of time spent drift aligning one night I was able to capture 4 minute unguided images at a focal length of 714mm, and the result wasnt BAD, but it could have been better... With the same mount, and guiding, I have managed 10 minute exposures at 1764mm focal length... and up to 30 minutes at the 714mm that I could only get 4 minutes with unguided.
Guiding is good, cheap and easy... Theres really no need to avoid it... Lets face it, after you've spent all that money on a mount, camera and imaging scope, whats another $400? (can be done cheaper, and more expensive depending on the components you choose to use.)
No, its not needed to image, but to image well... It is very much preferred..
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